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BUSTING FIVE MYTHS ABOUT LED GROW LIGHTS – LifeSpan

2015.03.19

With LED lighting being a relatively new product category, it is still lacking official industry standards. Producers sometimes exaggerate leading to great uncertainties and doubt when it comes to numbers. It is, therefore, no surprise that we often hear growers sceptical to the lifespan mentioned by the LED companies. Today we have reached LED myth number #5 on the list - Lifespan.

LED Myth #5— LifeSpan:

"LED manufacturer current claims about LED life expectancy disguise real LED product failure mechanisms and mislead customers."

While LED-based products hold the potential to achieve lifetimes that meet and even exceed their traditional counterparts such as HID and HPS fixtures. But manufacturers claims are often misconstrued by users who do not fully understand LED product failure mechanisms, nor see the difference between lifetime and reliability.

Mythbuster:

As we noted in last weeks post LED myth number 4, operating temperature is a major factor in the life span of an LED lamp. LED lumen (light output) depreciates at a much lower rate than other light sources. Where an incandescent light depreciates within the first 6-9 months, an LED will reach the same level in 15 to 20 years. So when you as a grower use theBest LED grow lights, you will have the chance to grow crops for years without having to replace your lighting system.

Most LED lights have an expected lifespan rated at somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 hours of use. In comparison, many other grow lights tend to last for around 20,000 hours before needing to be replaced. Besides decreasing long-term replacements costs, there are also money to be saved in lowered maintenance cost.

A 2013 report from the U.S. Dept. of Energy titled “LED Lifetime and Reliability,” stated:

”As with many performance attributes, LEDs have the potential to best other technologies in terms of longevity, but choosing the right product requires some understanding of expected failure mechanisms, lifetime, reliability and serviceability, as well as asking the right application-specific questions.”

We said it before at the beginning of our LED myth Series that All LEDs are NOT alike, so buyer beware.